Socially connected

Looks can be deceptive and in today's media savvy world it is all the more true. We look at pictures on social media - happy pictures, smiling faces, adventures and travels, perfect families and perfect relationships. The moment captured perfectly doesn't necessarily represent the life of the person. The story before and after the fabulous picture is often blindsided by the glory of the moment.

The problem is when we start believing that the life presented before is what the whole truth is. I have often assumed and judged a book by its cover and I am sure, others have done the same about me. My struggles, my mundane life, my aspirations, the tiffs, my desires are all my own. I am guilty of at times feeling that my life is not as exciting or perfect as the stories that I read online.

Social media is supposed to make us feel connected and it does do that to a certain extent. A text, a message, a "how are you?"might at times me the only real connection  you might have had. We cannot and are not meant to live in isolation, We, humans need our peers appreciation, we need to feel wanted and loved. My self-esteem might not necessarily and definitely shouldn't be dependent on others, but to assume that we can live without having stimulating  conversations, without exchanging smiles, without sharing our fears with others is just being foolish.

We all need a friend, we all need someone to reassure us that we are not the only ones struggling in life. Reach out to someone today , communicate without pretence. Hug, smile, not because you are nice, but because you remember the day when someone did that to you when you really needed it and it made your day.

The memories dearest to me are of people who have made my day, just by saying a mere hello. Yes , just a hello  and a glimmer of hope that you are thought of is all that we need at times. My lifelines have been at times the conversations on social media, my deepest fears shared on the chat box, my dreams and my aspirations shared with people I have not maybe talked to in person.

First step into Adulthood

Before long my son you will join the ranks of adults. Legally independent and master of your fate. Like all parents, I am scared to let you go, the urge to keep you protected and safe intense as ever. Yet the only way to experience life is to wholly embrace all that it brings - beauty, ugly, and and all the

mundane things in between. It is the baseline of your life.Loving the day to day living, "the boring" stuff is the key to happiness. Even adventure on regular basis becomes mundane.

It is said life happens when we are busy making plans. Nothing could be truer than that. There is no rule book to live your life, other than being true to yourself . Whatever makes you sleep at night - yes even you who can sleep now for 14 hours and more, will have some sleepless nights.

Stepping out in the big bad world, where you will be held responsible for all your actions, I wish you the wisdom and courage to sail through the rough winds of life.

Don't be afraid to make mistakes. There are no guarantees in life, none at all. Not in your career, relationship or health. Be flexible to ride along the waves and breathe. At times the only thing you can do to traverse the tapestry of life is just breathe, everything else will fall in place.

One important thing as you step out in the world for "winners", is that you define your success and the parameters for happiness. You define your own success.

All I actually want from you is to live... Live every moment maybe on impulse, maybe cautiously. But live. Fully, passionately and with integrity. And in all this living don't forget to dream and create a little magic.

Honestly clueless

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  Incessant chattering in the head, words, ideas, scenarios all running wild. You try to hold on to the thoughts, bring them back to present, but they are strong and fast and soon overpower the tiny sensible voice in your head to come back to present. Our minds are where we live. We are what our thoughts are.They define us.

  I have learnt to let the vagrant thoughts have their way; it is too tiring to try and control them. I have tried to capture the flighty words and make some sense of them, albeit not quiet successfully. The clutter can be overwhelming.Our truth is what we believe. We believe at many times what is convenient for us at the moment. Truth can be uncomfortable and not everyone has the courage to face it. Our version of truth is what we make it out to be.Our beliefs, our lives, are all based on experience, our ability to see the world and how open our minds and hearts are.

  Honesty is not about telling the absolute truth, it is about acknowledging what we perceive to be true. It is about presenting the facts as they are, without purposeful tampering, without twisting it. Honesty is looking into the mirror and seeing the reflection - flaws and all - seeing things for how they are to the best of our ability.

  I find myself leaning more towards maintaining peace and equanimity than wasting my energy in unravelling the truth.Some mysteries are meant to be unsolved, some issues unresolved.Some lies are best ignored, some deceptions better forgiven. When there is no absolute truth, how can there be absolute right or wrong? Acceptance of our limitations are what sets us free. I am learning that not everyone sees the world the way I do and that is okay.We use rose coloured glasses to see the world, filter the harshness to keep the heart soft and kind.

Take it easy

There comes a time in your life, when you have the choice to either take what happens to you seriously and fret about it, or to just look at the events from a skewered point of view  and laugh about it. People are screwed,  we are to a certain extent dysfunctional - and what do you suppose our relationships with others are like -  yes guessed right - screwed.

Yet this life - even the sanest and wisest of us are not what we seem like - layers and layers of deceptions  and add to  the recipe,  interactions with people who are damaged by life and its unexpected events. Life, desires, expectations and our greed for more, all literally twisting our minds  We are small beings with capability to talk and see - yet unable to communicate. We are mean people, with hearts that can be filled with love towards our lineage, also holds the capacity to be cruel to helpless beings. We can sear people's hearts with our fiery words, or warm their hearts with our kindness. Yes, we are capable of both. 

And then this is what happens when a serious person tries to write humour, - you go off track and sink to the bottom with the real and virtual problems of the world. Yes, we think - and actually believe that thinking helps... seriously? I have been  a proponent of teaching kids and adults to think - but honestly what good does it do? Yes "do" is the key word. Thinkers are not doers - the world maybe needs people who just take action. 

Teach kids early on that failures and successes don't make life - how we deal with it makes life - take both easy. Have fun , break rules, bandage your heart, shut your brain out to things that worry you, laugh at situations you have no control over, because crying definitely won't help either. 

All you get for being sincere, for taking others seriously is high blood pressure, anxiety and disappointments. We should be taught  and maybe serious people like me, given lessons early in life (maybe extra tutorials) that take everything and everyone you meet with a pinch of salt... Take life lightly, take yourself lightly.

Older but not wiser

It has been a while since I was excited about growing another year older. I look back and all I see is a flash of life zooming past. Time, the rebel , teasing me by fast forwarding my year to "that time of the year " again. Time flies not when you are having fun, but when you want it to slow. Age is not just a number, and irrespective of what my heart believes or wants to believe, I will soon be a year closer to actually be called "old" .I don't mind growing older, I would be ungrateful if I did , but I do want the time to slow down - to savor every passing moment.

Another year older and not a day wiser. The only wisdom I have gained in the past year is that being wise is no fun. Be foolish and make mistakes. In the past one year I have realized that I am in charge of only my happiness. I have learnt that sometimes it is okay to let the heart rule over your head. Forgiving comes more easily and that there is a reason why our memories grow weaker as we age. 

My eyes have gotten weaker too and that helps when I look at myself in the mirror to uplift my self-esteem. My moral compass has grown flexible and nothing shocks me anymore. The desire to prove myself and my ambition is waning every day and my tolerance for inane talks and stupidity is decreasing at an alarming rate. My disdain for irrationality has reached a s point where I feel too lazy to even respond with anger. I  am turning myself to just being a spectator and observer of human follies, including mine. Some things like religion, and politics , which I would have passionately given my views on, I am slowly turning indifferent to.

On other hand, I find more interest in anti-aging products and "health" - a sure sign that I am fast approaching the peak of middle age. I am getting better at finding excuses to avoid  social gatherings and I am more comfortable than I was last year with my idiosynarcies. I understand that I am human and it is okay to be swayed into the realm of devil from time to time and so long as it is only in thoughts and not actions, it is okay. 

What I do want, hasn't changed much, only the desires have intensified with an urgency that is only possible when  with growing another year older. I still want to see every sunset, every sunrise possible , just watch the leaves dancing with abandoned joy,watch the petals bloom, and find rhythm in the raindrops. I want to watch the snow flakes melt as they hit the ground, and listen to the stream happily  maneuver its way around the rocks to go where it wants to.

I want to travel the world, not to see places, but to meet people and comprehend what makes us human. I want to experience freedom, a free mind, an open mind, to dissolve all the experiences of the past and live again. I want to be able to go on long drives, with no destination in mind.

Yes... I am another year older and   the desire to live life to the  best intensifies  every day.   

Time outs

Be strong, be positive and march on. Everyday we live life, sometimes on our terms, sometimes on terms set by others. Yet, we live on. The wear and tear of everyday living - if we can call it that, our frustrations, our limitations, our loneliness and our pretenses, all just keep on piling up till we reach the brink of our tolerance and can take no more.



Being an adult is difficult. Being  a responsible adult is harder. One of the traits of adulthood is that we don't respond instantly or express exactly how we feel. Children can throw tantrums, can wail out loud in public, can laugh and play without any restrictions when and where they want. But as we grow older , we learn to grin and bear. We are taught to keep our emotions on leash, to swallow anger, to smile through the pain and even when we are happy to show restraint.

Restraint and  judiciousness  in our actions are essential to  fit into the norms of society. Society needs structure, discipline and restraint to exist.We  wouldn't be able to survive without the discipline to postpone our natural instincts, the covering up of our fears and frustrations. But all this covering up, takes it toll on you. The suppressed emotions waiting to surface, needs privacy to vent out - the poison needs to bleed out. Some take the help of alcohol, some put obsessive and streneous demands on their body.

Being  woman , I am fortunate that I have liberty  and the tool to let all the bottled up emotions to just escape which is perfectly acceptable by society. I cry .Nothing cleanses the heart and soul better than a good cry.The luxury of freedom to just wallow in self-pity, to just give my feelings the priority, is what I call time out for myself. I allow myself time -out from being strong, from being brave and happy and just let the wave of tears overcome every other feeling.

Time outs are just that- an intermission before we go back and start living like adults again, a break to be kind to ourselves, and indulgence to let ourselves just be self centered kids.

Empowering girls

Do we really need girls to be princesses? I see barbie dolls, I see parents referring to their daughters as princesses and all I want to do is scream out - no it is not right. I remember growing up, when I got into a physical fight with my brother and looked at my dad to help me out, all he said was, you have two hands, and legs just like your brother, fight your own battle, save yourself. It taught me to fight for my own battles, to be a warrior and not wait to be saved.

The west is generations ahead in terms of women's rights and I am so blessed to live in this society. Yet when I see parents treating their daughters to be princesses, I find it regressive. I feel disappointed when I see vain mothers, raising their daughters to be equally vain. There is this limitless opportunity for girls over here, to achieve anything they want, why teach them to seek for outside source to nourish their self-esteem? Self-esteem grows with accomplishment. Teach them to achieve, to compete with boys.Treat them to be equal.

We need more girls and women in well-paying jobs. In trades, in management, in politics. We need more doctors, lawyers, soldiers. We need to change the meaning  of tradition. I despise the word, because it represents blind faith - doing something because it has always been done that way.Foraging into male dominated careers also demands that men take up more roles in female dominated professions. The lines between provider and nurturer needs to be blurrier, if not totally erased. 

The time has come to redefine gender roles. Let kindness and respect be the qualities that women find  desirable in men . For true feminism, women have to change their perspective. Don't raise your daughters to be princesses, raise them to be queens - empower them with self-esteem and love and a positive body image. Raise your sons to admire strong women.